Par Avion
The scene opens on a closed eye. A fast ticking can be heard as the eye slowly opens and looks around. It sounds like it could be a clock of some sort, but as we see in the next shot, it's a blinker light on the dashboard of a car. The next shot is of a Gothed-out Claire with a big gash on the right side of her forehead. The sound of her breathing is the only thing we hear above the slight crackle of glass. She looks out the place where the front windshield used to be and sees a blonde woman lying out in front of the car. She pulls herself out the front and slides across the hood, Bo Duke-style, and runs to the figure. "Mum!! Mum!! Mum!!" is all she can yell as a crowd starts to gather. The intense scene fades to another eye shot. Seriously, Is there a writer on the show that has some weird eye fetish? Cause we sure see a lot of close-ups of eyeballs on this show... We are now back to the beach and whoever the perverted writer is (Are you happy now, Sicko?) gets another view of Claire's eye as she wakes up to see a big fruit buffet spread out on a table in front of her complete with a little card that reads "G - Day". I'm thinking that Charlie probably missed his true calling as the next Martha Stewart because he has cut up cantelope, bananas, and pineapple all arranged in perfect symmetrical order with little leaves to serve as ornamentation. It's a good thing. Heck, even his penmanship on the little card is perfect. Martha would be proud. Claire sits up as Charlie comes into her tent, holding Aaron. "Oh look Aaron, you're Mum has finally decided to wake up." It seems like Charlie must have already been up all morning taking care of Aaron, fixing a gourmet breakfast, and then stalking errr waiting for Claire to wake up. The more I see of Charlie, the more he reminds me of one of those wives from the old black-and-white movies. You know the ones, they've always got a rolling pin in their hands and are harping on their significant other about how they had to do the washing and the cleaning and the children raising, etc. etc. So as I'm picturing Charlie dressed in a flowery house-coat with a couple of hot-rollers dangling off his head, he hands Aaron to Claire and then sits down to tell her about his aching back and how she just doesn't appreciate a darn thing he does for her. Or maybe he just tells her that he took Aaron so she could sleep in. At least Claire has calmed down quite a bit since last season. Last year I would have paid anyone on that island a pretty penny to slap her every time she started freaking out about her Bay-Bee. Now, she actually wakes up without having Aaron clutched to her chest and manages not to wake the entire jungle up with her shrieks. Claire asks what the Hilton Continental Breakfast is about and Charlie says that it's a precursor to the breakfast picnic he's having "in her honor". Why? What did she do? Learn how to control her shrieks? What I think Charlie really means is that he's giving her a breakfast picnic because that's what Losties do when they want to get lucky. But I gotta warn C/C, the picnics always lead to trouble... just look at Shannon and Sayid, Hurley and Libby, Sawyer and his boar... So anyways, Claire is a little suspicious about all this and wants to know what's gotten into Charlie since he's been so depressed this last week and now it's breakfast in bed and picnics. He says that he woke up that morning and wanted to stop feeling sorry for himself and start "seizing the day." Oh, he wants to seize something alright. I'm not sure "day" is the right word for it though. He says there's no one he'd rather do some "day-seizing" with than her. She blushes sweetly and looks down. I know a lot of people think that Jate is way too vanilla and goody-goody with the charming Doctor and the heart-of-gold fugitive, but PB&J literally gives me a tooth-ache. They have got to be the most cutesy couple since Rob and Laura Petrie from The Dick Van Dyke show. Even if Charlie and Claire were to end up together off the island, I would fully expect them to still sleep in separate beds and keep their kisses limited to a three second rule. The scene ends with Charlie saying that they'll leave Aaron with Auntie Sun and Uncle Jin while they go for a "little stroll." They give each other matching dimpled grins. Awww... And my mind is now in sugar-overload. Give me some Jangst quick... Luckily before the hobbit and his girl can start prancing down the beach proclaiming the loverlyness of the day, we go to "The Save Jack Campaign" group. Sayid is looking at the map saying that he thinks they are two miles away from the barracks. He turns to Patchy and says that he doesn't expect him to confirm that. Patchy remains stoic and doesn't answer. Well you just said yourself you didn't expect him to, Sayid. Locke spits on the fire he's been poking at and says that he doesn't think the map is as accurate as Sayid thinks it is. Well no, it's only got landmarks and scales and directions on it... Nothing like the great, infallible Jesus Stick sunlight directions. I'd like to take credit for this snarkiness but this is basically what Sayid smart-alec's back to Locke. Locke responds that the stick did get them to the Station. Really Locke? It wasn't that Sayid got so tired of you that he wandered off and happened upon a cow which led to a deranged Patchman? "Oh the station that you accidentally blew up?" Sayid snarks back. Maybe Sayid should be writing these. He's doing a pretty good job of putting Locke in his place. Side Rant: Why do people think that when Sayid confronts Locke, then Locke is the idiot, but when Jack confronts Locke then Jack is just being a power-hungry jerk. Doesn't make much sense to me... but what do I know? /End Side Rant. Locke says that if Sayid would have warned him the basement was rigged with C-4 then he might have been a little more careful. Tip of the day for John Locke: When you are in strange "Other Territory" ALWAYS assume the worst. Kate is watching Patchy as he smirks at the two bickering men. "Why don't you just tell us if we're going the right way?" she says. If I'm not mistaken, last episode he said he would die before he helped them, so I'm really thinking he's not gonna hop up and start playing happy tour guide just cause she asked him. "You're going the right way." he says to her. Nobody is going to trust him though so I don't know what the point of asking him was. "Remind me why we're keeping him alive?" Locke says irritably. "What do you suggest? We shoot him like a dog?" Sayid says. "NO! I like dogs." Locke says. Rousseau speaks up and says that Locke's right and they would not trade Patchy for Jack anyway so they may as well shoot him. That seems like a rational thing to do. Oh and Crazy and Baldy are looking a little too similar in their dictatorship way of thinking about shooting anything and everything that gets in their way. Do I sense a new ship pairing? How about Rocke? Bald 'n Crazy? The 2 Psychos? Kate puts a stop to Bald 'n Crazy's maniacal dreams of shooting people when she says that nobody's shooting anybody. She says they're going to follow the map and takes off to get her man back. Back on Cotton Candy Beach, Charlie is leading Claire to his beach picnic. "Not bad." he says to her. "Not bad at all." she says excitedly and then literally does a hop-skip as she runs to the blanket. I kid you not. And then she broke into "The Hills are Alive" and made friends with all the jungle animals as she pranced up and down the beach. Okay, maybe I kid you some but she still did a hop-skip. I guess it could have been weirder... it could have been Charlie that did it. So Charlie starts showing her all his picnicky goodies and no, that is not an euphemism. But alas, Yogi Bear and BooBoo's pic-a-nic is cut short by the Park Ranger aka Desmond. Guess BooBoo won't get his picnic sex after all... and now that I have linked those two things up, I have really screwed with some of my childhood Saturday morning cartoon memories. So Charlie asks Des what he's doing down at the beach and he says that he's on a boar run and asks if Charlie would like to join him. Charlie has a tough decision - wander around in the woods with a basket case who takes every opportunity to tell him he's going to die or lounge around on the beach all day with the wifey. Charlie says thanks but no thanks, he'd rather score brownie points with Claire than run off with the Future Seer. Meanwhile, Claire has taken up Sawyer's ADD and gotten distracted from the conversation by a flock of birds. Desmond doesn't accept Charlie's refusal and tries to spell it out for him without letting Claire know. "Charlie... I really, really, really think you should come with me... Of all the things you could be doing that could potentially hurt or even let's say K-I-L-L you, I think that you should drop the pic-a-nic with Yogi and join me." he basically says, making sure to give Charlie a meaningful you-know-what-I-mean stare. Luckily, Claire is too distracted by the birds to see right through their "subtle" conversation. All of the sudden, she starts yelping excitedly. She knows how to get them off the Island!! Woohoo. I guess that means the rest of the season will be spent learning what happens to the Losties when they get back to America. Redemption, Schmeption... Claire's going to use birds! She takes off down the beach doing a couple more hop-skips, leaving Charlie and Desmond to finish the romantic beach picnic together. Claire runs up to Jin and Sun who is holding Aaron. She says that she needs Jin's nets and fish cause they have to catch the birds. "What birds?" Sun asks. "The birds that just flew over. They're only going to be here today." she says. I guess Sawyer's book must not be very good because he decides that he needs to pipe up and join in on the conversation nobody asked him to join in on. Kinda like what he did with our perfect Season 1 romance. So anyway, the obnoxious intruder snarks that the bird plan sounds like fun. Claire ignores him and asks Jin for his nets. "Nets for what, Bar-" Sawyer continues to try and be included. Course that's a lot harder to do when you're breaking your ping-pong punishment and handing out nicknames. Sun shoots him a look and he corrects himself. "Nets for what, Claire?" She finally decides to appease the intruder's curiosity and tells him that a flock of seabirds flew over and that they are migratory. Sun is still confuzzled. "They're tagged." Claire explains. "Tagged?" Jin asks as he hands her his fishing net. Claire says that scientists tag the birds and when they land, somebody will gather them up. "We can send a message." Sun says. I swore this had to be a plotline from "Gilligan's Island", so I googled it and sure enough the episode "The Sound of Quacking" came up. Gilligan faces a tough decision on whether to eat the carrier pigeon they found or send a message with it. Wow... I really don't have much to say about the fact that the writer's are now using old "Gilligan's Island" plots. All I can say, is that this dang well better be an inside joke with all the die-hard fans or I will really start to cry. What will be next? Kate and Claire putting on a fashion show while Jack and Sayid try to build a coconut telephone? I'll give the writer's a pass this time but I swear if I see a Soviet Astronaut land on the Island... I'm giving the show up. Back to the story, Claire wants Charlie to get some knives to help cut up the net. He is acting very distant, seeming like he finally understands Desmond's secret message to him to avoid everything that has to do with Claire and the birds. "How do you even know this stuff about birds, Claire?" he asks. "I umm... watched a lot of Gilligans Island with my mum." she says (except substitute Gilligans Island with nature shows.) "Doesn't exactly make you an expert." Charlie says sarcastically. Well it sure made you one when you gave us a lecture on polar bears because you watched nature shows when you were high, huh Charlie. But Charlie still doesn't see the point and walks off. Desmond watches from down the beach. He turns to go after he's satisfied that he has created a rift in the happy PB&J marriage. We go back to the jungle where Kate is bending down to fill her water bottle up at a river. Rousseau joins her. "Can I ask you something? I told you that you're daughter was living with them and you haven't asked me a single question about her..." Rousseau cuts her off by saying "Your friend - Jack..." This perks up Kate's attention real fast. Nope, nothing but "just friendship" there, right fellas? "You care about him?" Kate hesitates for a moment, unsure if she should let this strange woman know that she's been pining for the guy for 3 months now and she's fairly positive he's her soulmate. "Yes." she says slowly, her voice and eyes betraying the strength and calmness she's trying to portray. Rousseau wants her to imagine that if 16 years from now, Kate was told Jack is still alive but in her heart she knows he wouldn't remember her, that he wouldn't even know she ever cared about him. Kate takes all the information in and swallows hard. I almost expected her to jump up, throw her water bottle down and scream "NO! That would never happen... Jack would never forget me and he will always know I care cause you know why, Crazy Frenchie... Cause we're soulmates... That's why. And even if we were just two strangers passing on a New York city street, we would still recognize each other." True to her character though, Kate manages to keep her feelings in check even if her eyes are giving her away. Probably for the best though. We don't need Crazy teasing her with "Jack and Kate sitting in a tree... K-I-S-S-I-N-G..." Crazy finally responds to her first question by saying that she hasn't asked about her daughter because she doesn't want to know the answers. Kate and Rousseau rejoin the group and Kate offers Patchy some water. She asks him how he got on the island and Rousseau cuts them off by telling Kate not to waste her breath cause Patchy's a liar. I think we've already established that all the Others are liars. You hear me Jack? ALL Others are liars. You can't trust a word they say, even if they are blonde and branded. Patchy tells Kate they brought him on a submarine. The word submarine perks up Locke's attention just as much as the word Jack perks up Kate's. He tells Kate that ever since the event (violet light explosion, but I guess I don't need to tell you obsessors that) the underwater sonar doesn't work and it's impossible to use it. I call LIAR. Kate asks why and he says that she wouldn't understand. She says to try her. But Patchy misspoke, what he meant to say was that she was not capable of understanding. Low blow, Patchman. Apparently this strikes a chord with Kate because she gets very angry and asks why she's not capable. "Because.." Patchy says. "You are not on ze leeessst." he says. That's list for those who don't understand Russian accent. Kate wants to know what list and now Locke's interested too. Patchy makes a speech about a magnificent man.. blah, blah, blah.. same as Fake Benjamin Gale did last year. They don't call it brainwashing for nothing guys... He says that they are not on the list because they are flawed. Apparently this must be the same "Jacob's list" that Jack is not on either. Sigh... Guess Kate was right.. both damaged goods. "Don't speak to us as if you know us." Sayid says. He calls them all out by their full names and says that of course he doesn't know them. Except that he might have a fleeting memory of a Locke that was para-. He was cut off by Rousseau before he got to finish saying paralyzed. So a paralyzed Locke is good but now Locke is bad? What? But they've got more important things to do right now rather than discuss Locke's qualities. There's a weird security system to investigate. Rousseau has managed to find huge concrete pillars with two half-circles on either side of the top of them placed at strategic intervals all down the valley. Patchy looks up at it in glee as the others look at in confusion. Back to Operation Bird, Jin and Claire are rigging up some sort of trap with a net and sticks in the rocks. He tells her to "Please... Sun... help." as Sun comes carrying two buckets of fish. Claire and Sun begin cutting up the fish to make chum to entice the birds into their trap. Sun says that this was her mother's worst fear, that she would end up married to a fisherman and cutting up fish. Claire says that her mom was a librarian. "Was?" Sun asks. Claire evades the question and goes to put out her bait. Back to the beach, a flock of birds falls for Claire's trick and starts to settle in the water by the trap. Gilligan, The Skipper, and MaryAnn are waiting up the beach, holding onto a make-shift rope attached to the trap. One of the birds lands on a bucket of fish and just as Jin is about to pull the trap and capture the bird, a couple of shots ring out and the birds scatter. They look up to see Desmond, holding a gun. Jin gets a few cusses in Korean in at him before Claire runs up to him wanting to know what the hell is wrong with him. Desmond say's he sorry, that he was just shooting at a boar. Claire finds it hard to believe that he just happened to be hunting in the exact same spot as they were setting their trap. He says that he was following a boar and she wants to know where it is then. "It got away." he says. She nods her head and then says "You don't want me to catch the birds, do you?" "Why wouldn't I want you to catch the birds?" he says. Maybe Desmond was an animal rights activist in his previous life. Then again, that wouldn't explain him on a boar hunting trip, would it? Claire can't think of a response, so she just storms off down the beach. Back to the Security System, they are all still just standing and looking at the pillars. "What is it?" Kate says and then starts to go forward. Luckily, Sayid is still thinking with the brains for the whole group and pulls Kate back, warning her not to touch it. Sayid asks Patchy what it is and Patchy asks Sayid what he thinks it is. Sayid thinks that it's a security perimeter whose sensors will be activated if they pass between the pillars. He wants to go around it. Patchy says that Sayid is right but that the security system doesn't work anymore... *singsong voice* Liiiiaaarrrr... But he says if Sayid wants to waste his time, it won't matter anyway because the pillars circle the whole barracks. There's no way of going around them. Kate and Sayid look at the map to see if he's telling the truth about that or not. Meanwhile, Locke strips off his backpack and grabs Patchy. He pushes him forward into the security system. A magnetic buzzing begins as Patchy stands between the pillars and looks back at them. "Thank you." he says before he starts convulsing. At least he was polite. He begins to foam at the mouth and then his neck gets red as blood oozes out of his ears. And then the security system zaps him back to the other side of the pillars. He continues to twitch for a few moments before finally dying. Hands-down - the sweetest Lost death I've seen. That was so intense. Plus, it helped that I didn't care about the dude and I was getting really tired of writing the word Patchy. Kate and Sayid look on in horror. "Sorry." is all Locke can say to them before we fade to commercial. Back from commercial, Sayid is trying to get a better look at the unfortunate Patchman. "Why did you do that? We needed him." Kate yells at Locke. They go back and forth about how they wouldn't have traded for Jack anyway and Kate says that they could have at least discussed it. Discussed what? Whether or not to throw a man to a sonar-pulse death? I guess they could have made a pros and cons list. Pro... We see if he's telling the truth. Con... A man dies a horrible, painful death. Couldn't they have just thrown a stick? "Pardon me for not knowing that they had a sonic weapon fence." Locke says. Again, what was my tip of the day for John Locke? When you are in strange "Other Territory", ALWAYS assume the worst. Sayid wants to know if Locke is really here for Jack or not. They agree to discuss it later, probably cause they don't want to get his girlfriend upset. Meanwhile, she has an idea of how to get around the system. "We're going over it." she says. She asks Sayid where the ax is and he goes to get it out of Locke's backpack, even as Locke is trying to stop him. Sayid pulls out a box of C-4 from Locke's pack. "I thought you didn't know there was any C-4?" Sayid says. "Well I stand corrected." It wasn't a misunderstanding of words John, it was a blatant lie. "You never know when a little C-4 might come in handy." he says. "You'll have to do better than that." Sayid says before walking off, leaving Kate to glare at the liar. Back on the beach, Charlie is putting Aaron in his crib. Claire storms up to him and asks what's going on with him. He says he doesn't know what's going on, that he's been with Aaron all day. "You're lying to me Charlie." she says. "I am not lying." he says. Well sure, maybe not about that... but I think I know a little secret Mr. Sawyer's got on you... She wants to know what happened to the "seize the day guy" from this morning. He says that he just doesn't want to advocate false hope. She says that she won't bother him again with her ideas and that she wants him away from her bay-bee. She knows that she's on her own now and she screams for him to just go. So much for the non-shrieking Claire I was getting used to. Back to Team Jack, we go through a little montage of scenes showing them chopping down wood, and tying a support system together. Then they throw a huge branch up and over the top of one of the pillars and put the support system underneath it. Rousseau wants to know why they don't just use the explosives Locke took. "Be my guest. You wanna go stick it on there." Locke says. Plus, then where would future plotlines come from, Danielle? Kate bravely decides to climb up first. Not my first choice. I think I'd use the moron aka Locke to test out the system before I'd let Kate go. But being the chickens they are, they just let Kate go. I guess they figure it's easier than arguing with her. Cause what does Kate have? Give me a M, Give me an O Give me a TIV followed by an ATION. What does that spell? MOTIVATION!!! Go Team Jate! Kate shimmies up the tree. Kudos to Ms. Lilly. I really don't think she used a stunt double much, if at all. They don't call the girl "Monkey" for nothing. She swings down and drops onto the other side of the system. Everyone holds their breath for a couple of seconds, but nothing happens. She makes it over and waves to the people who are literally ten feet away from her. Locke and Rousseau ignore her but Sayid waves back. I don't know why I thought that was hilarious, but I couldn't stop giggling. After letting the girl go first, Locke bravely decides it's safe enough for him. He follows her, but we don't get a shot of him shimmying up the tree. Guess they don't call Terry O'Quinn "Monkey". Instead we see Kate checking out 'Ol Patchy's dead body as Locke drops down beside her. Back to the beach, Sun and Claire are taking care of Aaron. Sun tells Claire she has every right to be angry. Claire says that it doesn't make any sense that Des was hunting boar so close to the beach. Sun points to Charlie and Desmond who are arguing a little farther down the beach and says that whatever it is, they're still talking about it. Claire pawns Aaron onto Sun again and goes to get some answers from Charlie. Back at the beach, Claire is playing hide and go seek with Desmond. She tracks him down the beach as he makes his way over the rocks. "What the hell are you doing?" she asks as she sees him reach behind a rock. She was probably desperately hoping he wouldn't pull out a Virgin Mary statue. The girl can't get a break with secretive men. "Stay back." he says as she looks around him to see a bird sitting on a patch of grass. He reaches over and picks the bird up. I'll ignore the glaring error that there is no way a bird would ever let himself be picked up like that unless it was hurt which I don't think it is. So moving on, Claire wants to know how Des knew that the bird was there. He says he didn't, but she doesn't buy it. She thinks that's what him and Charlie were arguing about. So once again, she wants to know what the hell is going on. He points to some rocks down the beach and says that's where Charlie slipped and fell in, breaking his neck. "What are you talking about?" she says. "That's where Charlie died." he says, mysteriously as we fade to commercial. Back from commercial, Claire is walking towards Charlie, holding the tagged bird. She says that Desmond told her everything about his visions and Charlie's neardeaths. "You don't believe all that do you?" he says as we merge to her flashback. A now blonde and very pregnant Claire is walking in the hospital. She goes into a room. Her mom is still lying in bed hooked up to all the machines. "Now who turned the telly off? Don't they know you love your nature shows?" she asks her unconscious mother. She flips the TV on to show a flock of birds. She talks to her mom for a few moments, finally telling her that she needed to tell her something she should have told her a long time ago. "I'm pregnant. And I'm giving it away." she says. "It's for the best." She talks to her mom about how she didn't know how she did it, raising Claire alone. Then she says she's sorry for yelling at her and saying she hated her before the crash and cries that it was all her fault. "I'll see you soon." Claire says before we end her final flashback and go back to the beach. Charlie and Claire are standing on the beach. Claire continues to hold the bird, while Charlie reads a message on a note. It says that they are survivors from Flight 815, they have survived for 80 days, and they were 6 hours into the flight when they got off course and turned back to Fiji. That should have ended the note but instead Claire decided to write an epic poem all about not finding rescue and making the best of living on the island and death and new life. As Charlie is reading the novel, we see various shots of other Losties around the beach. Sawyer is reading 'The Fountainhead', still probably contemplating his ping-pong loss. And I'm just thankful that we only had to endure him for a whole 15 seconds this week. Can we shoot for 5 next week? Charlie finally finishes reading Claire's 'Ode to Rescue' and says its perfect. She says she's not giving up on him either. "You're going to be okay." she says. Charlie smiles and pins the folded up note to the birds tag with a little stick. I guess anybody who was worried about what would happen to the rest of the season when they all get rescued next week doesn't have to worry anymore because there is no way that note is going to stay on that SEA bird. Either it will fall off in the wind or dissolve right when the bird lands in the water. Geez, and I was really hoping that genius Gilligan's Island ripoff idea would work too... It did make for a very pretty shot though as Claire lets the bird fly off as the sun shines over the palm trees in the background. And I want numbers on exactly how many Jaters were thinking about how pretty it would be if Jack and Kate got white doves to release at their wedding, cause that's immediately where my mind went. Charlie and Claire hold hands as they watch the flock of birds head out over the ocean. And with a nice transition, we cut to Kate in the jungle looking up and seeing the same flock flying away. Sayid comes out of the bushes and tells Kate that they're here. Aaaahhh! My Jater heart is going a mile a minute. So close and yet I know they're still so far away. They creep up and look through the bushes to see The Barracks. People are riding bicycles and walking over manicured lawns in front of houses. And suddenly Kate's eyes zoom in on someone. It's like she has Jack Radar Vision, cause the person she zooms in on is Jack, running across the lawn towards them. Her mouth drops and she can't control herself as she rushes forward and starts to call "Jack". Sayid pulls her back and for once, I am mad at him for doing that. I mean how bad could it be if you let her go? At least we'd probably get one shot of her jumping into his arms and wrapping her arms around his neck before the Others took them down. But alas, Sayid pulls her back and then we see that Jack was actually running to catch a football pass. Kate's expression turns from a "I've got to have him back right now" expression to a "WTF is going on here?" expression. They watch Jack and Tom pass a few more times, the music building excitedly. Finally Jack catches the ball one more time and then slams it to the ground in a touchdown dance as we cut to black. FAKING IT! That's all I have to say to anybody who dares question my beloved Jack. If you want to know what that looks like, go watch Kate's expression during the dirty bear cage scene.